TPC Journal-Vol 11-Issue-1

61 The Professional Counselor™ Volume 11, Issue 1, Pages 61–72 http://tpcjournal.nbcc.org © 2021 NBCC, Inc. and Affiliates doi: 10.15241/dw.11.1.61 Dorrie Williams is a master’s candidate at Vanderbilt University. Marcella Melanson is a master’s candidate at Vanderbilt University. Bradley T. Erford, PhD, NCC, LPC, LCPC, is a professor in the Peabody College at Vanderbilt University. Correspondence may be addressed to Bradley T. Erford, PMB 90, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN 37202-5721, Bradley.t.erford@vanderbilt.edu. Dorrie Williams, Marcella Melanson, Bradley T. Erford The Professional Counselor : Author and Article Characteristics From 2011 to 2019 This meta-study evaluates publication patterns and trends occurring in the first 9 years of The Professional Counselor ( TPC ). Both author (e.g., gender, domicile, employment setting, top individual and university contributors) and article characteristics (e.g., topic, research design, participant type, sample size, statistics) are identified, with a particular focus on research articles. Almost 64% of lead authors and all authors were women, 92.1% of lead authors were affiliated with universities, and 3.4% of lead authors were internationally domiciled. From 2011–2019, the University of Central Florida featured the greatest number of lead authors, and the top author overall was Dr. Kathleen Brown-Rice. About 58% of published works were research articles, and of those, 69% used quantitative design methodology. Nearly all coded research variables were stable over time, except for participant types, as the proportion of adult participant samples increased while undergraduate participant samples decreased over time. Keywords : meta-study, author characteristics, article characteristics, publication patterns, quantitative design The Professional Counselor ( TPC ) is an electronic journal published by the National Board for Certified Counselors (NBCC; The Professional Counselor , n.d.). Beginning publication in 2011, this peer-reviewed and open-access journal publishes research and practice-based articles related to school counseling, marriage and family counseling, counseling supervision, theory development, counseling ethics, mental and behavioral health counseling, and multicultural and international counseling. The primary goal of this quarterly journal is to provide relevant and interesting resources and information for individuals all across the counseling profession, including counselors, counselor educators, mental health practitioners, graduate students, and supervisors. Thus, TPC is meant to address the professional development and informational needs of all counselors, regardless of specialty, work setting, or discipline. Each issue of TPC is released alongside a digital reader’s digest, a collection of summaries of the articles that are included within the issue. Myriad characteristics within the counseling profession have evolved over the last decade, and along with this evolution, counseling research also has changed. Just as it is important to periodically review changes to the counseling profession, it also is vital to review journal characteristics to observe and analyze how journals evolve in relation to societal and cultural changes (Erford et al., 2010). Such an analysis informs the editorial board, authors, and readership about who and what is published in a journal, characteristics of methodological considerations, and the trajectories of those characteristics. As TPC began publication in 2011, this is the first multi-year review of the journal’s characteristics, providing an opportunity to examine trends within this journal that have yet to be studied. Historical reviews such as this allow for longitudinal monitoring of the advancement of, and challenges occurring within, the counseling profession. Erford et al. (2010) identified several viable processes for analyzing and recording journal publication patterns. These methods include content analysis of published special issues and sections, qualitative synthesis, and quantitative meta-studies. From 2011–2019, five special issues were published in